Mississippi Burning is a 1988 film based on the investigation into the real-life murders of three civil rights workers in the U.S. state of Mississippi in 1964. The movie focuses on two fictional FBI agents who investigate the murders. Willem Dafoe's character is loosely based on the actions of FBI Agent John Proctor. Hackman's character is very loosely based on FBI agent Joseph Sullivan. The film also stars Frances McDormand, Brad Dourif, R. Lee Ermey and Gailard Sartain, and was written by Chris Gerolmo and directed by Alan Parker. It won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography, and was nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Hackman), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (McDormand), Best Director, Best Film Editing (Gerry Hambling), Best Picture and Best Sound. The film has been criticized by many, including historian Howard Zinn, for its fictionalization of history. According to Zinn: while FBI agents are presented as heroes who descend upon the town by the hundreds, in reality the FBI and the Justice Department only reluctantly protected civil rights workers and protesters and reportedly witnessed beatings without intervening.[1] Mississippi Burning was preceded in 1975 by a television docudrama titled Attack on Terror: The FBI vs. the Ku Klux Klan, depicting many of the same events. None of the movies used the real names of the murderers, due to legal considerations. Mississippi Burning never even mentions the names of the victims. They are referred to as "The Boys". The film presents the policeman's wife as the informant. The identity of the real informant - known as "Mr. X." was a closely held secret for 40 years. In the process of reopening the case, journalist Jerry Mitchell and teacher Barry Bradford uncovered his real name.[2] The opening scenes of the movie were some of the most harrowing ever seen in any film of the 1980s. An Apostolic church was the first building seen in the film, ablaze with the Ku Klux Klan calling card - a wooden cross -...

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...The MississippiBurning Trial" was not for the cold-blooded murders of three young civil rights workers, but rather for the violation of their civil rights. The federal government wanted to break Mississippi's "white supremacy" stronghold on the South. "The MississippiBurning Trial" proved to be the opportunity to do so. The three branches of the federal government and their various departments were actively involved in bringing about this civil rights trial in Mississippi and these activities and personal views are well documented in court records, department records, and the press.
The federal government's Michael Schwerner, James Chaney, and Andrew Goodman were working to register black voters in rural areas and small towns of Mississippi. Their deaths were brutal at the hands of local Klu Klux Klan members. Brutality, however, was the norm for dealing with "outsiders, niggers, and nigger lovers" who dared to try to force Mississippi to change. The violence and racist language that make our skin crawl today was not only accepted by the majority of white Mississippians, but was openly practiced. Being of like minds,the powers of Mississippi knew they could count on one another for support from the local to the national levels. The federal government had the manpower, communications network, and finances to break apart Mississippi's white racist unity. If...

...Film Review:
MississippiBurning
By Kelly Johnson
In Mississippi June 1964, three civil rights workers were murdered after being released from jail for speeding. The movie, directed by Alan Parker is based on a true story of the FBI investigation on the MIBURN case to find the three civil rights workers. Around this time African-Americans were found to be inferior compared to the white Anglo-Saxon Christian members ofMississippi.
Agent Alan Ward tries everything to solve the case within the books, but his partner Agent Rupert Anderson, a former sheriff in Mississippi, understands the local culture and knows the case won’t be solved abiding by the books. Together they go through a diversity of leads and come up empty-handed, until the town sheriff’s wife (Frances McDormand) steps forward and reveals some shocking information. In order to solve the case, the two contrasting agents must not only overcome the hostility of the local authorities and the black community but challenge with their own differences as well.
But even with "MississippiBurning" being based on a true story, it is not a documentary. This movie is a gritty police drama, bloody, passionate and sometimes surprisingly funny about the efforts of Agent Alan Ward and Agent Rupert Anderson into the disappearances of these three men. Few men could be more opposite than these two agents Anderson and Ward....

...MississippiBurning character essay
In the film “MississippiBurning”, directed by Alan Parker, characterisation is employed very effectively to illuminate the themes of tolerance and social change in the southern United States in the 1960s. Parker uses the buddy/buddy formula through Ward and Anderson to act as a focal point for the plot; as well as being an analogy for the greater conflict in society, in that they have polar opposite personality traits and initially cannot stand each other, but their shared belief in justice allows them to tolerate each other and eventually work together to solve the case. From the beginning of the movie, Parker clearly shows that Ward and Anderson are a mismatched duo in every way possible. Several contrasting personality traits are explored in various scenes; such as Ward’s youth and naïvety compared to Anderson’s experience and cynicism, and Ward’s conventional way of doing things compared to Anderson’s unorthodox, personal style. The progression of their relationship towards co-operation is used to represent themes of tolerance, but highlights the difference between personal conflicts and societal conflicts. It also reveals the director’s message: that tolerance and co-existence is always possible; however, some issues and prejudices are too deep-rooted to enable co-operation and result in overall social change.
One of the major differences between Ward and Anderson that is...

...What was your reaction to the events associated with Freedom Summer 1964, as depicted in the film MississippiBurning?
My reaction in regards to the events associated with Freedom Summer 1964 where it was depicted in the film MississippiBurning was horrific. There is no reason to simply murder three people. Nonetheless, absolutely no reason at all to murder three people based on their beliefs and intentions. The methods that the Ku Klux Klan members had used to torture their targets are sickening and horrendous. No one should ever have to go through and experience that type of torment ever. The firebombing and burning of church Mt. Zion was extremely uncalled for. Who in their right mind would even consider burning down such a holy and religious site as a church in the first place, whatever type of church it may happen to be.
The means of torture in this movie is worse than brutal; burning down houses, killing and destroying the people inside along with their possessions, ripping apart families and traumatising small children.
Even though the film had such scenes, I quite enjoyed the fact that as a result of being alienated by the rest of the population, the blacks formed a closer relationship to one another than they would have normally creating the feeling of a really close tight-knit community.
How historically accurate is this movie?
The accuracy of this movie...

...“Racism is man's gravest threat to man - the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason.” This quote from Abraham Joshua Heschel sums up how inconsiderate and cruel people can be, without processing how evil their actions and words are. Few of us seem to realise how crooked, how universal and how evil racism is. In the film ‘MississippiBurning’ directed by Alan Parker we see the idea of ‘man’s inhumanity to man’, through racism, fear and corruption. Parker helps us understand the thoughtlessness and evilness of this idea, with the use of verbal and visual techniques such as dialogue, camera angle and shots,
After three Civil Rights workers, who were organizing a voter registry clinic, go missing in Mississippi's Jessup County, the FBI deputes Agents Rupert Anderson and Alan Ward to investigate. Agent in charge Alan Ward does everything by the book, while Agent Rupert Anderson however was a Sheriff in Mississippi before joining the FBI and understands the local culture. He's also prepared to bend the rules a bit if it will help in the investigation. After the duo encounter hostility at the hands of the county police and other males, more agents are brought in. This leads to a media frenzy, with Mayor Tilman proclaiming openly that this community is an Anglo-Saxon democracy, an example of successful segregation that has been able to withstand the onslaught of integration, and total non-acceptance of Jews, Papists, Turks, Mongols,...

...MississippiBurning Essay
Emily Tremaine
The film, MississippiBurning (1989) can be classified as a very useful source for a historian studying the Civil Rights Movement, however, there are a few noticeable limitations that could prevent the historian from gaining a full understanding of the true culture in the Southern States of America. The film thoroughly examines the role of the Klu Klux Klan and touches upon the role of the media. Despite the useful information that is provided throughout the film, there are certain flaws that limit the historian from gaining knowledge on the true nature of Southern Americans.
In the 1950s the emergence of the Civil Rights Movement triggered the Klu Klux Klan organisations to ramp up their terrorisation of the African Americans. The most significant of these was the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan led by Robert Shelton. In the Deep South considerable amounts of pressure were put on blacks by the Klan not to vote. An example of this was in the state of Mississippi. By 1960, 42% of the population was black but only 2% were registered to vote. Lynching was still employed as a method of terrorising the local black population. (Klu Klux Klan, http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAkkk.htm)
The film ‘MississippiBurning’ supports this information and displays some of the methods the Klu Klux Klan used to attack and threaten African...

...MISSISSIPPIBURNINGMississippiBurning (1988) is a hard hitting action drama designed to shock and educate the viewers on the topics of racism, justice and the law. When three people are killed in the state of Mississippi, two FBI agents are sent in to investigate, only to find out that people are being terrorised brutally in an unfair justice system. Using tactics that are considered ‘low’, they find a way to arrest those responsible in a federal court because the state courts were unjust. The events and convections used help to teach the viewer, get them thinking about the topics raised but at the same time amuse them and keep them entertained with the suspense and slight horror of the film.
Racism is a major issue that takes place in the film, it is viewed negatively and the director Alan Parker attempts to show to the audience the downsides and how devastating it is, how unfair it can be. The constant, terrorizing attacks against black people by the KKK in are horrific and cruel. Innocent people are killed and homes are put in flames or destroyed for no other reason than the fact that a group of people are racist against others. Film codes used help to place a negative feel in some of these scenes like the use of fire, symbolising evil towards the racist acts. The music performed as well by the black community show the great amount of sadness the people have to suffer. Many various camera...

...MISSISSIPPI MURDERS 1964
On June 21, 1964, three young civil rights workers; a 21-year-old black Mississippian, James Chaney, and two white New Yorkers, Andrew Goodman, 20, and Michael Schwerner, 24; were murdered near Philadelphia, in Nashoba County, Mississippi. They had been working to register black voters in Mississippi during Freedom Summer and had gone to investigate the burning of a black church. They were arrested by the police on false charges, imprisoned for several hours, and then released after dark into the hands of the Ku Klux Klan, who beat and murdered them. It was later proven in court that a conspiracy existed between members of Neshoba County's law enforcement and the Ku Klux Klan to kill them.
The FBI arrested 18 men in October 1964, but state prosecutors refused to try the case, claiming lack of evidence. The federal government then stepped in, and the FBI arrested 18 in connection with the killings. In 1967, seven men were convicted on federal conspiracy charges and given sentences of three to ten years, but none served more than six. No one was tried on the charge or murder. The contemptible words of the presiding federal judge, William Cox, give an indication of Mississippi's version of justice at the time: "They killed one black man, one Jew, and a white man. I gave them all what I thought they deserved." Another eight defendants were acquitted by their all-white juries, and another three...